Absolutely, am a pan of tofu in pan fries. I also use less meat and then bulk put with red lentils, chickpeas, or mixed beans. But the only pure-lentil protein meal I’ve managed to keep on is the Butternut squash curry, because the squash masks the chickpeas. The mealy texture of lentils makes them hard for me to appreciate solo, especially chickpeas (I can’t eat peas for similar reasons) so I tend to half-and-half. A single chicken breast still feeds four people if bulked right. Hummus is fine since the chickpeas texture isn’t as much an issue, and makes for good vegetarian soul bowls.

Unfortunately tofu is not cheap here, it costs about as much/slightly more than chicken. :( Regional pricing I suppose, I’m from an isolated farming nation so luxury goods have to be imported at large mark-up. Anything we don’t grow here gets priced to match :/ Lentils are cheap though, and you can also do a lot with a baked potato!

Much agreed. Humans are the only species were aware of that can make ethical considerations in their diet, and there are so many ways to do that.

My preference is towards sustainably and environmentalism, as limited by my income bracket. So I love mushrooms, love vegetarian dishes, eat in season; but still eat eggs, dairy, and cheap meat for affordable protein. But I prefer sustainable farming practices, and using low-cost cuts like sausagemeat that might otherwise be wasted. I can’t afford most plant-based alternatives because they’re considered ‘lifestyle’ luxuries, so I have to have whey protein instead of pea, etc. But eggs are cheap enough I can splurge on free range with SPCA cert, and I love me a sweet-potato-mushroom burger patty if I can afford one. Nut mince is also great for nachos.

This means I support insect farms for future protein sources, since they use far less resources than even plant-based alternatives and are much cheaper and more land efficient. That makes me different from most vegetarians and vegans it seems, but I don’t consider our philosophies to be in conflict. Ultimately we share a common goal in maintaining more ethical diets that limit the harm we cause, and there are several approaches to do that. Every step we can affordable maintain is progress to a kinder and more sustainable world.

Your point about the tick is correct, but I’m not sure if that counts as veganism? Theres a significant difference between vegetarianism and veganism beyond the diet itself.

Vegetarianism is a dietary restriction around consuming flesh, whereas veganism is a philosophical restriction around animal suffering/exploitation. But even that philosophy can have different interpretations (what counts as suffering? What counts as exploitation?).

Thus vegans having a reputation of being inflexible, because eating nonvegan is a violation of their personal principles; whereas most vegetarians won’t care what you eat so long as you still provide something they can eat.

Therefore I’d expect vegetarians don’t eat lab meat (it’s flesh) but many vegans may (if they believe it is developed ethically, and doesn’t incentivise unethical practice).

But IMO both of the terms are pretty absolute and inflexible. An increasingly large number of people ate ‘vegan except for X’, or vegetarian [98]% of the time’, and we don’t have words to distinguish them from those who don’t plan to reduce animal products at all. I’d like if there was, to encourage people to have more varied diets without seeing it as ‘all or nothing’. Significantly reducing animal intake is still an environmental win even if they can’t eliminate it.

Vegetarian is fine, there is no flesh. Vegetarianism is typically a dietary restriction, rather than a philosophical one.

Vegan: it depends. Cultivating figs may be seen as expotation, like bee’s honey is; regardless of the insect’s actual life or wellbeing. Each individual person decides what counts as vegan.

I don’t see the point in this level of specificity, because by eating anything at all you consume fungal spores, tiny mites, microbes etc. Plants are also alive. So there is clearly a line where life is permittably consumed.

If ‘experiencing suffering’ is that line, insects do not seem capable of it, only responding to basic stimuli. I once watched a one trying to eat its own partially severed head, turning it in its front legs while its mouth parts rapidly twitched. It evidently had no comprehension.

Depends on the vegan you’re talking to.

Wild figs may be but as soon as you’re cultivating fig varieties that require the fig wasp, you are artificially increasing the wasp population specifically to perish, in order to sustain human horticulture. Much like honey or milk, the fact you don’t eat the animal’s flesh might still defy the spirit of ‘no animal exploitation’. Most pollinators do not explicitly perish as part of pollination; figs are one of the foods vegans may disagree on.

The good news is that there are a small number of fig varieties that can be fertilised without the wasp (either by hand, or self-pollinating clones). In a lot of countries this is the variety that may be grown because importing wasps could be ecologically dangerous.